Relief from Writers block
by Lythande
Summary: I was trying to write a TOS novel and suffered from writers' block. So I sat down and added comments to make a story all of it's own.


Summary: I was trying to write a TOS novel and suffered from writers' block

Summary:I was trying to write a TOS novel and suffered from writers' block.So I sat down and added comments to make a story all of it's own.

Disclaimer:Paramount is good, Paramount is great, Paramount owns Star Trek. Nuff said. Any resemblance to actual Star Trek characters is intentional, and fervently hoped for.

ReliefFromWriters'Block

The girl - for she was a girl, really; only fourteen years old - was a writer. She wrote stories, some of them very long, most of them about Star Trek; but she had a problem. She could hardly ever finish them. It wasn't uncommon for her to have five stories she was work-ing on at the same time, but most of them were never finished, good beginnings though they may be. She had a terminal case Writers' Block.

On a day in April, shortly before a Star Trek convention she was going to go to, she was working on a story that could easily have been a series of books, had she been able to finish it.

** **

** **

**Chekov's Enterprise******

book One: what we leave behind

Chapter 1

Commander Pavel Chekov looked around his quarters, soaking in the details. He'd soon go the way of his friends and shipmates; a-way. Captain Kirk and Commander Scott were retired, albeit unwillingly. Uhura was teaching at the Academy, Spock was an ambassador, and Sulu had the _Excelsior. he wasn't exactly sure where Doctor McCoy had gone, but he was still in Starfleet somewhere. He, Pavel, had nothing to go to. Another ship, maybe. He wasn't ready for retirement, and wouldn't take it if he was. He had nothing to teach, and was only a shipless commander._

Serving on a starship was all he'd known for twenty-five years. Mostly on the _Enterprise, shortly on the __Reliant, a short stint as first officer on the __Excelsior, lately on the __Enterprise-A. He honestly didn't think he could survive without a ship and the duties and surprises that came with it. He knew life couldn't be perfect forever, but one could always hope. Maybe he'd try to see about getting a position on the __Excelsior. _

He grabbed his things and walked out the door, leaving his life behind.

~~~

The girl - she had a name, but it's not crucial to this tale - was instantly afflicted with Writers' Block and could go no further. She tried forcing herself to write, but all the sentences ended like

Pavel wanted to see the admiral but THIS ISN'T WORKING GARBAGE TRASH NO GOOD STINKING CRAP

Thank God for backspace.

She'd tried leaving the story to stew in its own juices before, and had a pile of dead manuscripts because of it. Nothing ever seemed to work. 

After a few days, she forced herself to write something decent. 

The call about reassignment from Admiral Trelany was abrupt, but Pavel was hardly surprised. He was the only member of the original Lucky Seven that wasn't somewhere he wanted to be. In fact, he didn't _know where he wanted to be. _

Waiting outside her office for a blonde, gum-chewing secretary to admit him, he thought about it, and none of his options were appealing. The _Enterprise was just a ship like any other without her Captain, and he didn't want to stay there any more than he wanted to retire. That eliminated two of three options. Getting on a ship seemed to be the only one left._

"You can go in now," the secretary said suddenly. He nodded civilly and stepped into the brightly lit office. 

The admiral was sitting behind the desk, staring distractedly at a padd. She wasn't really unattractive; fifityish, with long blonde hair and dark green eyes. Her skin harbored a faint greenish tinge and her ears swept upward to form points. She was half Vulcan, with Human mannerisms. All in all, a strange combination. She looked up as he entered the room. 

"Hello, Captain," she said. "Have a seat."

His step faltered a bit as he heard the word 'Captain', but he sat in the proffered chair.

She folded her hands on the desk in the placidly Vulcan style. "As you have probably inferred, you have received a promotion. Congratulations, Captain."

"Thank you, Admiral," he heard his voice say. The accent sounded about right, anyway.

"Your ship is the _Russia." He couldn't help smiling a little. "It's a brand-new Excelsior class vessel, but we do not believe there to be any problems left to work out. Most of your crew has already been selected, but you may request some special crew members."_

"I will have to get back to you on that," he said. His brain was still a little fuzzy. 

"You first assignment is to accompany a diplomat, Amanda Harris, to Perator, in the Zedi system, so that she may smooth over an incident with the natives." Pavel had no clue what incident she was talking about. "You leave in two days at 0900 hours. Any questions?" 

Now fully in control of his mind, he thought of a only single question. "Just one, Admiral. Who is the new captain of the _Enterprise?"_

"He is an ex-crewman of the _Enterprise," she said. "His name is _

And that's all the further she ever got. The girl was stuck on the name, a silly thing really, considering how many crewmembers had been on the show alone, never mind what she could make up. Part of it was that she had no real idea what was going to happen in the rest of the story. She knew you should have an ending first, but good advice was hard to follow. 

The story sat for over a week, but she thought about it every single day. She was continually trying to find solutions to her dilemma, but never found any. It was, frankly, exceedingly annoying.

Finally, she got uncommonly bored, exactly one week before the Star Trek convention. She pondered her story, but thought of a great idea for another one instead. What she found technically wasn't a cure for Writers' Block, but rather her own personal balm. She pulled a chair up to the computer and opened Microsoft Works. She then sat down and wrote this story.


End file.
